


Many and Many Times I've Touched You

by orphan_account



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Body Worship, Cunnilingus, F/F, Spoilers for Post-Timeskip | War Phase (Fire Emblem: Three Houses), Spoilers for Pre-Timeskip | Academy Phase (Fire Emblem: Three Houses), non-explicit violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-22
Updated: 2019-09-24
Packaged: 2020-10-26 09:08:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,229
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20739752
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: I've known the ghost of your touch for so long now.





	1. One

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for your interest. This is a long-form illustration of me struggling with second person; I hope it hasn't come out too rigid or confusing.

The first time you catch a glimpse of her bare skin, words fail you. 

It’s an impossibly hot day, and you’re returning from a group assignment with Berndetta, who splits from your presence as soon as humanly possible when you cross the threshold together into the slightly cooler halls of the monastery. You walked to your Professor’s door, and opened it to see her without her jacket and breastplate for the first time - her bare arms, taut with muscle and slick with sweat. You catch the barest sight of a long scar arching upwards out of her boots and towards her unadorned thigh, like a thunderbolt falling from heaven, from your position at the side of her desk. Her chest, normally bound with wrap and held tight, several thin pieces of cloth the only separating the air and her breasts.

For the first time, you, Edelgard von Hresvelg, think of another human as beautiful. She isn’t beautiful in the most classical sense of the word - ‘beautiful’ isn’t the right word for her chiseled, scarred body. Byleth is beautiful in the same way a wildfire or dragon is; dangerous and mesmerizing. 

The thoughts fall out of your brain. You stop halfway to her desk. You feel distantly feverish.

“Edelgard...I didn’t think anyone would be coming in today.” Her small smile makes your heart skip.

“Yes, ah...I…” At her quizzical head tilt, you shake your head a bit to snap out of your reverie. “Sorry, the heat outside is getting to me, I think. I came only to tell you that I’d finished weeding the stable, and to give you the new manifest for the markets.”

“Thank you, Edelgard. You didn’t have to do that today. Please take care of yourself.” Byleth’s brow slightly creased with worry; the most emotion you’d seen her ever project. A pang of guilt runs up your spine. 

When you place the sheets of paper on her desk, she reaches for it and your fingertips briefly brush the calloused knuckles of her hand - and they feel so decidedly cool to the touch that you almost linger, just for the comfort of her.

“I will, Professor,” you answer, still slightly shaky. 

“And tell Hubert I hope he feels better.”

“Of course.” 

Your walk back to your bunk is difficult; a pink haze of sudden infatuation and what a small, rational part of yourself says is probably the beginnings of heat stroke settles over your vision like a smoky cloud.

That night, as you lay atop your sheets in your smallclothes, trying desperately to cool off, you listen to the cicadas chirping outside and shamefully allow an image of the professor - no. Your Professor, a blushing part of you insists. _Yours. If we are allowed to dream, dream high._

You picture her calloused hands on the small of your back, her breath at your head. Cold, firm arms enrapturing you, the feeling of skin on skin like water in the desert. You sigh her name before sleep finally claims you.


	2. Two

The second time...the last vestiges of hormonal puberty have hit you right in the middle of the early stages of putting your ambition to the test. The only way to keep it at bay is wearing the armor of the Flame Emperor, and even then, you instinctively find yourself drawn towards your teacher, the crimson steel around your heart giving you the strength to ask her probing questions about her allegiances. 

When you’re given a chance to break from the White Heron Cup ball, your eyes instinctively try to seek your teacher, wherever she is. You find her in an alcove off to the side in the outside courtyard, the distinct but not totally unpleasant smell of alcohol wafting over your nose as you approach her. She is unmistakably despondent, sitting on the stone with a bottle of wine next to her. Her Hero’s Relic has been cast off to the side haphazardly, and even for you, the sight of it is almost flinch-inducing. 

“Professor...are you well...?” 

She blinks and slowly turns her head towards you, peering into the dark you’re emerging from. “Edelgard?” The soft way she speaks your name makes the iron mask you put on for social niceties like this soften immediately, and you quicken your pace over slightly. 

“I’m here,” you say.

“You look good tonight,” she responds with her characteristic smile, her features rosy. You’re nearly winded by the compliment. An insane impulse in your stomach roars to life and immediately tells your brain to push her down. _Push her down, grasp her wrists in hand, and kiss her everywhere she will let you. She looks so beautiful below us like this. Take her._

Stop. Please. I’m begging you, for 5 minutes, you mentally plead to...yourself? You’re not sure anymore. You’re still not sure how to respond to your professor without making a fool of yourself, so you merely sit down next to her. 

“You’re drinking alone? Claude and Dmitri are looking for you at the ball.” 

“Well, you’re here now, so I’m not anymore. And...I respect Claude and Dmitri’s abilities and minds but with all due respect to them, I have little interest in dancing or drinking with men.” 

Something in your chest leaps into your throat. At the implication. _What? What does that mean? Explain. Tell me._

“Oh?” You ask, hopefully coyly, as you push a strand of white hair out of your face. “I didn’t know you had such strong preferences, Professor. You always seem to get along well with everyone.”

“Well...I don’t do anything special. I just listen. And try to be kind, above all else.” 

“You’re in a unique position to do that. Your stance as a political outsider here lets you approach people without bias. It’s one of your many admirable traits.” 

Byleth snorted quietly. “I’m not that admirable.”

“No?” You scooted closer to her, trying to get a better glance at her face. “What have you done that is so condemnable?” 

She is quiet, quieter for longer than is usual even for her. After a moment of nothing but the sound of summer insects chirping and the clink of her lifting the wine bottle to drink again, she nearly whispers. 

“I couldn’t do anything for those people at Remire.”

Oh. Oh. Everything about this situation slams into place. A stone falls into place on your heart, the weight of sin as heavy as anything you’ve ever felt. Pity, remorse, guilt, and need settle into place inside you, mixing together into a more foul cocktail than any alcohol you could ever taste.

“Professor, you - “

“I know. I know the only way out of that situation was over their graves. But these weren’t people fighting for anything, they were just victims. In the wrong place, at the wrong hour.” She sniffs, her voice wavering at the end of the sentence. “No armor, no standard, just dead men and women.” Byleth doesn’t cry. To her immense credit, she doesn’t weep. 

You want to do anything. You want to do everything. Edelgard von Hresvelg settles merely for taking her Professor’s hand. The minute you do so, the very second that your fingers entwine for the first time and the heat and the dark of night seems so far away, you feel the petty lust inside you cocoon and transform into a more complicated emotion. 

You love her. It is unfair. It is unfair for this woman you love to have to hold a blade in this brutal and irrational world. It is unfair for a heart as good as hers to be forced to kill for a living. Injustice pickles and biles in your throat. You would trample this world to dust to remake it for her. You will. You would. 

Even if she won’t thank you for it, in the end. 

Her squeezing your hand so tight brings you back to reality. “Professor, I…I’m sorry. I didn’t know it hurt you like this.” You encase her free hand in both of yours. The roughness of her callouses rub against your pure white gloves. “I promise you. When I’m empress, I won’t allow brutality like this to continue.”

Byleth smiles at you, and it breaks your heart for the third time tonight. 

“I believe you. I’m always proud of you, Edelgard.”

You want to die on the spot. You want to kiss her again. You want to die. You want to ascend to heaven, if it exists.

“Thank you, Professor.” To your own immense credit, you don’t cry either. 

“Will you walk me back to my quarters? The stairs might be tricky for me right now.”

“Of course.” 

You pull her up, and she leaves the wine bottle behind. You decide to take it with you, if for nothing else than you’re not particularly keen on other students perceiving your teacher as a drunkard. You hold its neck in one hand as you shift some of Byleth’s weight under your own, and help her forward. You make quiet small talk with each other as you go, giggling conspiratorially at whispered jokes. 

“Hubert would kill me if he saw us like this. He might actually kill me.”

“He would not.”

“He’s already threatened to kill me once.”

You frown. “I told him to stop doing that. It’s unproductive.”

This makes her laugh, and this makes you snort, and then also laugh. Has she laughed before? It’s...well, _cute._ It’s infectious. You ache a little more.

By the time you’ve reached the head of the dormitory where your teacher sleeps, she’s nearly dozed off and your arm is a little sore. Still, you manage to get the door open and help her down onto the bed. The soft impact is apparently enough to wake her up slightly, as she calls your name as you turn to leave. 

“Yes?”

“Awhile ago…” She seems lost in thought. “You showed me the scars on your hands.”

You unconsciously flex your palms, inside of their gloves. “I did,” you say, remembering the moment you’d shared with her that night. You’d never regret it, but her bringing it up like this point-blank was somewhat embarrassing. 

“Hmm,” she says, quietly. “I wanted...to show you something too, at the time, but it didn’t seem right. Can I do it now?” 

You blink. “Yes, if you’d like, but you don’t have to share anything you don’t want to, Professor.”

“No, I think...I think it’s important. It feels important. Can you help me with my boots?”

You acquisint, trying very hard to not be both nervous and excited at where this is going. You sit on the side of her bed, helping her pull her footwear off and gently setting them aside. Her lace stockings, objects of many of your stupider fantasies, stare back at you. 

“Now...hold on…” She reaches down, and briefly curls into an uncomfortable ball, pulling her stockings off and freeing her legs in a couple deft movements. You instinctively look away, blushing. 

“Look,” Byleth says after a moment. You’re almost scared to turn your head, but any inherent eroticism in the situation is shattered the second you do so.

Your Professor’s legs are nearly solid scar tissue, with the number of injuries it looks like they’ve suffered. Cuts. Burns. Punctures. Islands of unblemished skin were few and far between. At one point you see silvery, cracked wounds spiraling in a crater-shaped pattern, like an earthenware vessel being repaired with gold. The sure signs of a wound caused by dark magic that was healed before it could spread. 

“Professor…”

“I just wanted you to know,” she looks down at you from the head of the bed, smiling. “That you weren’t alone.” 

It was the second time you’d seen her bare skin so close.

The walk back to your own dorm felt indescribably lonely without her. You didn’t speak to anyone for the rest of the night, save a small sentence to a concerned Hubert to assure him you were alright. You stayed awake a long time, staring at the ceiling, before you went to sit at your desk. An array of simple pencils and art supplies (a gift from Hubert for your birthday) stood ready to be used, and the half-empty wine bottle towering over them suddenly seemed enticing. You lifted it and took a strong pull - it was slightly bitter, but the hint of berries in the aftertaste quickly endeared the drink to you.

You picked up a pencil and let the feelings slowly fall out of you, the solid black lines arranging themselves into shapeless lacey flower patterns. 

Sleep was harder that night.


	3. Third

The third time.

You’d invited the Professor to come with you to your coronation. So much had happened since the time you’d had your last intimate talk. You’d watched her sob and weep openly at her father’s death and burial. You’d seen her descend from the sky and the dark with her sword in hand, both her and the blade glowing like an act of the Goddess itself. You’d meekly watched as she had cleaved through Those That Sliter in the Dark like a natural disaster, splitting them apart in every conceivable direction the bladed whip of the Sword of the Creator could reach. 

You’d watched her run through Solon, the look of blank fury on her face as she pushed him off the impaling blade, his blood anointing her like the visage of a war saint. 

For the first time in years, you were scared. Scared of her. Scared of yourself. Scared for your plans.

Your invitation to the coronation was a transparent ploy to keep an eye on her, both for your own security and out of a worry for her mental health. Manuela and Hanneman had been largely responsible for every one of Byleth’s classes since...the incident, and even food was being delivered to her office by students from your house on a volunteer basis. To your own surprise, Hubert was often one of the ones venturing out for this. You were deadly curious about what they said during these brief sojurns, but you knew Hubert would tell you if you asked, so you refrained. 

The ride out of the monastery was uneventful but emotionally fraught when you discovered Byleth insisted on riding at the front of the column with you, but spoke or looked at you little. When she did, she only did so tersely and matter of factly, often only commenting on directions, the weather, or the state of the horses. 

You grit your teeth. Stress was weighing on you like an avenging angel. 

By the time you’d accepted your crown and began the long ride back, the silence had become unbearable. You steeled yourself for an uncomfortable conversation when you stopped the column to rest at an Empire-friendly inn on the way, one hopefully where you could find a quiet corner to speak to her. 

Your plan is somewhat sidetracked by the innkeeper’s insistence on the standing Emperor and the Chosen of Seiros take his best room. 

“That really won’t be needed. I can sleep with the horses in the stable,” Byleth said casting a side glance at you. The innkeeper, a portly middle-aged man, looked like he would rather cut his throat on the spot than allow that. “Seriously, it is fine, I’m a mercenary - “

“We will share the room,” You say quietly. “Don’t fret, Professor.” 

The intensity in your voice must be more than you intended, because Byleth deflates in the middle of her sentence and relents. She apologizes to the innkeeper and slinks into the hallway for the rooms. 

She doesn’t exit for the rest of the night. You take your lunch outside with Hubert, who is mercifully quiet beyond some small talk about battalion formations. It calms you down, and you remind yourself how grateful you are for the man. The paths he and your Professor have walked down are strikingly similar and yet opposite; Hubert has cloaked himself in sin for the sake of you and your Empire, of your justice. Byleth, meanwhile, has shed a mantle of blood and the mercenary life for the sake of becoming a living miracle, possibly the only one still walking Fodlan. All for...well, for what? The church? The Empire? Her students?

_You?_ A meek part of you quietly asks. 

You wanted to know. 

-

When you retire to your shared room for the night, your Professor is sitting in the dying light with a candle, reading from a book at a quaint writing desk. You make a quick note of the contents of the room, an ingrained trick you learned at a younger age to spot assassins and escape routes. Said desk, a wash closet with basin and a comfortable looking bathtub, two beds (was some part of you hoping for one?), a window featuring a view of the woods outside, and a small bookcase which seems to house only an anthology of Adrestrian history. Byleth appears to have read Volume I, and is making a good attempt at Volume II.

You close the door softly so as to not alarm her.  
“Edelgard.” She says softly, looking up from her book. 

“Good evening,” you reply, sitting down on the bed closest to the door and loosing your hair out of the bun you’ve had to keep it in all day. You thought the royal style looked quite good on you, but it grew irritating after several hours. _Keep calm, you think._ _Be kind - she’s suffering too._

Byleth swallows a reply and stands, replacing her collected books back onto the shelf. She dawdles for a brief moment to look out the window before turning and speaking. 

“Edelgard, I’m…” Pause. You don’t turn around to look at her, but you can feel your chest tighten with anxiety. “I’m really sorry,” she sighs. “I shouldn’t be acting like this. It’s an important week for you, and I’m making it harder for no reason.”

You swell with relief; but you still feel like if you turn around and look at her, something will break in you and everything you’ve hidden from her will come spilling out of you like so much viscera.  
“My teacher, it’s…” You pause to swallow. “It’s fine. You being here is enough. I invited you for your because I felt it would help to get away from the monastery for awhile.” 

Deep inhale. “Oh.” Oh? “Well, it did help.” You hear the unmistakable of her removing her sword belt and setting the Hero’s Relic she carried in a slightly safer spot than ‘propped up against a desk’. “I appreciate you thinking about about me.”

If only you knew.

“I’ve just been figuring out some things these past few days.” 

“Oh?” Your turn now. 

There’s a pregnant pause in the room, before you feel her sit on the bed behind you. You can feel her soft eyes laid heavy on your back. “I thought if I could keep...keep you all close to me - my father, you, the other houses, the Church and Knights - I could hold you all together, stop this all from eventually falling apart. But seeing your resolve at the coronation made me realize that wasn’t possible.”

You’re quiet. You’re not sure where this is going. The pauses were starting to itch at you like an ill-fitting shirt. 

“It’s not that I want to keep you from your path. I know you’re strong, Edelgard. I know you’ll use your power for the good of Fodlan. But...I wanted these joyful days to extend forever. They made me happy in a way I’m not sure I’ve ever been. I’ve spoken more in this past year than ever before. I wanted to be selfish with you, but seeing you so far away in that armor and crown made me realize...I was being foolish. Being neutral was never an option for me.”

She touches your back - you can feel the softness of the gesture even through your ceremonial garb. You feel like something is going to pour out of you. It’s an anxiety feeling; it’s a hopeful feeling. You want to see her face, but -

“I want to stay with you, Edelgard. I want to wear my allegiance with you with pride. You and the Black Eagles mean something to me. I want to walk with you.”

Something restraining you snaps. Is this happening? In your wildest dreams, did you ever seriously dare to believe your beloved teacher would follow you into the hell to come? You’re overcome. Disbelief echoes out of your mouth in a shaky, nervous laugh. You didn’t even feel like this when the literal weight of an empire was placed on your head. 

“You do? Truly?” You don’t feel like you’re in control of your own mouth.

“I do.” Zero hesitation. She had been thinking it over.

“It won’t be easy.”

“I know.” 

“You’re going to learn things about me you won’t like.”

“Nothing is going to change my opinion.” 

The suddenness of her response causes the last of your doubt to fly away like so much grass in the wind. 

“Professor, do you love me?” There it is. Something surges up into your chest like a fiery bolt, spreading through your limbs and filling you with a perverse confidence that runs through your gloved hands and causes them to shake. 

Beat. Beat. “I am. I’m sorry if that makes you think less of me. And I can maintain a respectful distance if you want - “

It is here you can finally stand it no longer, and you swivel on the spot to embrace her, your hands finding the small of her back as you pull her down with you on your sides. Your faces are mere inches apart when you open your eyes, and bemused excitement runs over her visage like mice lost in a maze. 

“I have waited for far too long to do that,” you say quietly. “My fool of a teacher.”

“Edelgard…” The corners of her mouth creak upwards into a smile of an intensity that you’ve legitimately never seen on her before, a smile that finally reaches her eyes and causes them to sparkle like renegade stars. “I’m surprised.”

“Where are nearly the same age. What makes this so perverse? Do you believe us too far apart in power? I am the empress. Who will stop me?”

She laughs, genuinely. “You’re right. I’m sorry. I’m a bit of a sham. You’ve always been smarter than me.” 

“Not true,” you say, in a voice of mock reproach. “I cannot seem to get this country mercenary I adore to kiss me.” 

What follows next is so unbelievably pleasant that you’re not sure if it’s real or not. You feel her as close as you ever have, and no amount of your fascinations could’ve prepared you how she seems to oscillate between quiet satisfaction and hasty need. You alternate drinking each other in and devouring one another in turn, the spell is only broken by Byleth worming a hand into your traditional top only to be frustrated by your armored undercoat - when she breathes an angry sigh into your mouth you laugh and break apart from her. 

“Unfortunately for you, I came prepared for your plans.” Your whispering is more of a dare than a scolding at this point. 

She merely smiles at you, in that way that breaks your heart and repairs it three times over. Her messy hair falls over her head in a cascade of light green, and even the reminder that your beloved has some new intrinsic connection to your sworn enemy doesn’t halt your good mood. _I wonder if she would allow my ladies-in-waiting to style her hair,_ you think. 

“Edelgard?”

“Hmm?” You gently move a strand of hair out of her face for her.

“Do you want to continue?”

“I, ah…” You did. You really did. But…

“I don’t want to hurt you.”

You laughed, and gestured to the shell of ceremonial dress and armor that still encased you. “Your concern is touching. But this dress is murderous to take off alone, and I would rather not be apart from you for almost an hour, dear teacher.” 

Byleth responds with a “hmmm” of her own, and her gaze sharpens near intangibly. You know this look - it’s the way she looks before she moves through a battlefield like a river, untouchable and deadly. 

You swallow. 

“Let me help.”

Blink. “You want to...help me take this off?” 

“Of course.” 

Gears turned behind your head, a thousand conversations with yourself occurring silently. You did want to continue; you’d envisioned it so many times at night now, the ghost of your professor undressing you with her strong hands, both of you bared to each other - but this was no ghost in front of you, and the thought of the real Byleth seeing your naked, scarred body was...not unpleasant, but it would make you vulnerable to her, something you were not sure you wanted. You trusted her, but the merest possibility of her reacting negatively to the network of scars that covered your body - well. 

“Will you be gentle?” You quietly whisper to her.

Her answer is a soft taking of your gloved hands, where she kisses each knuckle in turn. Your palm opens, and she places another kiss in the center of it before nuzzling your hand against her cheek. The gesture is so loving that you’re sure you’re blushing now, even as she peels the glove off that hand. Panic rises in your throat as the bruise scars from manacles, the silvery aftereffects of poorly healed scalpel cut, and a large, awful looking black and circular section of your palm are revealed to the last person on the planet you’d want to see them. You nearly recoil, but she kisses each scar in turn before nuzzling your hand again, this time on the bare flesh. That feeling in your stomach distorts again, becoming confused, panic wrestling with affection like a mongoose and a snake. 

“We don’t have to do anything,” Byleth says, her eyes closed in contentment, cheek still in your hand. 

“I want to,” you protest meekly. Your voice sounds so far away.

“I know. It’s okay. It’s okay.” She moves her head, as if she was an affectionate cat. It’s a little ridiculous, but the gesture does make you feel better. “Let me take care of you. Can I?”

You nod slowly. 

Byleth kisses your hand one more time for good measure. “Can you sit on the end of the bed for me?” She stands, and goes over to the door, making sure it is shut firmly. You decide you can do as she asked, and move over to the edge. Byleth removes her coat, setting it aside on the other bed. Your gaze follows her as she moves around the room, clinging to her like a piece of driftwood awash in the sea.

Byleth stops before you, folds her bare arms, and seems to be appraising you for a moment before saying: “Okay, I got it.” 

Before you can ask what she has, she’s knelt before you, taking your remaining gloved hand in both of hers, laying a kiss on it before removing it in one motion. If the mirrored scars on this hand give her pause, she doesn’t show it as she treats the palm and knuckles on your opposite hand the same as the other. When she begins to unbutton the cotton sleeves running up your arm, you swallow audiably, another lump of iron panic descending towards your stomach.

Byleth lets go immediately when she notices, her face turning up to you, concern evident. “Is this okay?”

You feel yourself nodding at her even as you bite your lip. Silver razor lines run down your arms to the scars on your palms, connecting them like in a tree diagram. When Byleth returns to her work, you realize with some shock that your panic at being touched is receding, the caress of her lips carrying it away even as they move up your arm - on your left, and then your right. The sensation is cloying, healing. 

You barely notice when she tilts your one of boots to remove it, gently placing it aside. She runs fingers and thumb over your stocking, a short little note of appreciation humming out of her before she repeated the process. Everywhere Byleth’s hands went, a note of anxiety about the revealed flesh she found followed, and everywhere that occured her lips soon followed. The feeling was magic, and soon you find yourself unable to stop your uneven exhales, flush rising to your face in full force.

When she has removed your top, your frock, your mail shirt and your corset, she spares a moment to wind her head up to your neck, kissing it there as well, making you shiver. “You are unbelievably beautiful,” you hear her whisper. “Do you still want me to take care of you?”

You hope your noise of consent isn’t too pathetic. You possibly fail, as the chuckle that echoes out of your lover is nearly sadistic. “Okay. You can tell me to stop at any time.” 

You feel her kiss the notch of your knee, and you dutifully move your leg to the side to let her in. Before you can react, she’s pulled your stockings to your feet, freeing your scared thighs and legs. You exhale, trying to focus on the ceiling. Occasionally, you get the courage to peek down and see her shock of light green hair bracketed between your pale legs. You feel your hands curl into your teacher’s hair, holding onto her for dear life.  
When her tongue first touches the part of you that has ached for years, you hear yourself inhale sharply, your palms curling into fists full of Byleth’s hair. The feeling of mouth swiping across the molten sea in your loins is like liquid honey all over your senses. At some point, your Professor’s hands curl around your knees, simultaneously holding your legs in place and giving her a spot to anchor to as you shiver. Your bare legs cross over her back, trying to pull her deeper into you. 

You gasp audibly when you feel her close her mouth over the most sensitive part of you, suckling gently. Your mouth moves only to whisper-scream her name as you feel a shockwave of pleasure begin to emit through every part of your body. When you trip over and stifle a warning, she gently squeezes your thigh and keeps licking, only stopping when you explode, every taut muscle in you suddenly going slack. 

“Professor...Professor...Professor…” Angels dance in front of your vision as you fall backwards onto the bed, gasping. 

When you next open your eyes, she’s joined you on the bed, drawing you into an embrace, your face drawn into her chest. A sense of warmth and safety hums distantly in your brain as she whispers to you. “It’s okay. Come here. It’s alright, now. It’s alright. Edelgard. My Edelgard. My Empress. Everything is okay, now.” 

Her soft words pour over you like healing rain, and the last sight you catch before you drift off into a relaxed doze is the sight of her scarred neck, an old sword wound echoed there like a jagged bolt of lightning.


End file.
